Awkward. Read online

  All I know is that Jack has asked for it, and I’m not going to let him get away with this.

  “Oh, Gawd!” Delilah moans, glancing down at her feet. “I have wine on my shoe!”

  “Come on, let me help you,” Theo says, tutting in sympathy. “We’ll get you cleaned up. I’ll grab some paper towels.”

  “Sorry,” I say, wincing as the two shuffle toward the restrooms. I glance toward her shoes, but I can’t see a thing on them.

  “There wasn’t wine on her shoe,” Jack says simply, once we’re alone. “I don’t even think she stepped in it.”

  “And you wonder why you can’t keep a date!” I shake my head at him. “What was that?”

  “You kicked my knee enough times to leave a bruise. Your fucking heels hurt.”

  “I was trying to help you.”

  “Trying to cripple me, maybe.”

  “You might at least get a sympathy card then,” I snap, retrieving my fallen heel from under the table and sliding it back onto my foot. “You can’t use my weaknesses to your advantage.”

  “Weakness?”

  “Don’t play dumb. You know the only spot I’m ticklish is on the bottom of my foot. I can’t handle it.”

  “That’s not the only place I can think of.”

  My face burns at the memory to which he’s referring. That damn mistletoe. Jack Darcy had leaned in to kiss me, so many years ago, and his hand had reached for my waist. His thumb, that glorious thumb of his, had stroked the bare swatch of skin just above my jeans.

  That single stroke of the thumb had turned me on in so many ways. It was the first time I’d ever felt such urges. I can still remember the thrill to this day, so intense I shiver just thinking about it. I’d shivered then, too, and Jack had felt it. We both had.

  Until I vomited.

  “Well, good luck ever touching me there again,” I say, and realize that statement has come out just a bit too loud. At least two nearby tables are staring unabashedly at us, and it’s all I can do not to blush tickle-me-pink and die of embarrassment. “You’re right. This was a horrible disaster.”

  “You should’ve listened to me.”

  “You were right,” I spew at him. “I’m sorry I had more faith in you than you do yourself.”

  Jack stills, whatever he was about to say cut off by my statement. Biting his lip, he gives a slight shake of his head and looks almost disappointed.

  “I’m sorry,” he says finally. He glances down at his shirt and offers a weak shrug. “This is why I worried about involving you. Whenever I pull a woman into a romantic situation, it turns sour. Apparently, you’re not immune.”

  “Forget it,” I say, waving a hand. My heart is beating faster at the mere thought that I had hurt Jack’s feelings. He’s the toughest man I know, and he doesn’t crumble to much of anything. The despair on his face is too much for me to handle. “Another shirt bites the dust. Come on, laugh about it.”

  “It’s not—”

  “Look what I packed.” I bend to retrieve my purse and drag out the extra shirt I’d brought as a joke. “Feel like changing?”

  “I thought you had faith in me,” he says, a whisper of a smile playing at his lips.

  “I did. I do. This is left over from last time.”

  With a sideways tilt of his head, he surveys me for a long moment. I feel him scoping me out—my hair, my face, down to my lips, then back to my eyes.

  “Thank you. I’ll go once they get back.”

  I nod in agreement. We proceed to wait over fifteen minutes while I twiddle my thumbs and sip the last of my wine. Jack picks at what’s left of his steak, and we mostly ignore the very extended absence of our two guests.

  “Can I pay the check?” Jack finally asks when the waiter offers a dessert menu. “I’ll take it for all four of us.”

  “You don’t have to—”

  One look from him shuts me up. Jack pays the check, and I peer around, making sure Delilah hasn’t left a purse at the table. Neither her nor Theo’s personal belongings are here, so I stand and gesture for Jack to follow me on an evacuation attempt.

  “Should we find them?” I ask. “I feel like it’s rude to just leave.”

  “I have to use the restroom,” Jack says, gesturing to his beautiful white shirt, now stained and useless. “Maybe we’ll run into them. If not, I think they might have disappeared.”

  I follow him to the restrooms, figuring I might as well use the ladies room while we’re here. Those four glasses of wine have to go somewhere, after all, since they didn’t end up on my shirt.

  Jack turns the corner into a hallway and stops so abruptly that I run smack dab into his back.

  “What the—” I freeze, first spotting the signs for Men and Women on the restroom doors, and then spotting the couple before them.

  Theo and Delilah are wrapped in an embrace far too indecent for a Michelin starred restaurant. His hand is on her thigh, her dress is tucked into her underwear, and their tongues are wrapped around one another while a series of moans and grunts tell me things are much further along than I expected.

  “Oh, no,” I whisper. “This is a horrible date.”

  “Not for them,” Jack murmurs. “Come on, Allie.”

  Resting a hand on my back, Jack steers me through the front of the restaurant and past the crowd of prying eyes. Not only is Jack’s shirt a mess, but we’ve clearly left without half of our party, and our party attracted a significant amount of attention.

  “I can’t believe it,” I tell him. “Were they about to have—”

  “Looked like it,” he says, a bit grim. “I’m sorry my luck with dating rubbed off on you.”

  “I didn’t—don’t—even like Theo,” I say with a hint of surprise. “So why is it annoying that he’s dry humping another woman while he’s supposed to be on a date with me?”

  Jack’s heading toward the car, but appears to change his mind. He shifts direction, his hand cinching lower on my back until his arm is wrapped around my waist. My head leans against his chest as we wait at a red light.

  “Where are we going?” I finally ask. “The car’s that way.”

  “I thought we could walk along the beach a bit,” he says. “I could use a breath of fresh air. Clear my head.”

  “How much wine did you drink?” I ask. “Can you even drive?”

  “All of one sip. I can drive, but you can’t.”

  “And Delilah,” I continue. “How on earth could she have picked Theo over you?”

  Jack propels me forward as the light turns green. “That’s what you’re supposed to be helping me figure out.”

  “Probably because you told her you wanted six kids!”

  “Come on, Allie. Give me a break. I don’t know what my mother was thinking.”

  “Your mother thinks you’re going to be a king,” I say, and it’s a bit slurry. “And Delilah’s going to be your queen. Like how the ancient Egyptians married each other to align families.”

  “What does Egypt have to do with any of this?”

  I wave a hand at him, feeling a little more wobbly than expected. That fourth glass of wine had probably been one too many, but it had given me a nice little halo of warmth to use as a buffer between Jack’s body heat and my own.

  “Thanks for watching my dates,” Jack says. “I appreciate it.”

  “That sounds kinky, but you’re welcome. For what it’s worth, I don’t think you’re as horrible a dater as you think.”

  Jack glances down at his shirt. “Is that right?”

  “You’re funny, you’re handsome, you’re nice...” I shrug. “Sometimes you just say the wrong thing. But you’re getting better.”

  “I never thought I’d have to change for someone.”

  “You don’t, Jack. You don’t.” I turn to face him, my fingers reaching unconsciously for his. “You’re perfect just the way you are. And the right woman will appreciate that.”

  “Then why all this pomp and circumstance around first dates?”
/>   “Because these women need to get to know the real you. You deserve someone who’ll know the real you.”

  “Shouldn’t they want to know the real me without me pretending to be someone else?”

  “You’re not pretending to be someone else, you’re just...” I trail off. He has a very good point. “Don’t change, Jack,” I say softly. “Be patient.”

  “I have been patient. I’m thirty-two. I’m ready for the right woman to come along.”

  “You’ll find her. Plus, it’s not like you haven’t had some bites in the past. And you’ve had plenty of first dates!”

  Jack purses his lips and shakes his head, a sure sign he’s not offering conversation.

  “Fine,” I tell him. “But you know as well as I do that you can have any woman you want. You just have to find the one who deserves you.”

  We walk in silence for a few minutes after this, the wind whisking around us as the waves play at our toes. I’ve long since kicked off my heels, and Jack has graciously reached over and eased them from my hands, carrying them by his side.

  “What if I suck at kissing?”

  “What?” I stop walking, toes sinking into the cool sand. “That’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard, Dr. Darcy.”

  “You said it,” he argues. “I’ve taken women home after a first date before, but there’s never any follow up. It’s not the first date that’s the problem, it’s the next, and the next.”

  “Oh, Jack,” I say with a weird, gurgling sort of laugh. “You are not bad at kissing.”

  “Sex?”

  “I’m sure you’re excellent at sex.”

  “How do you know?”

  “Because, I just...I can tell.”

  Jack’s eyes settle on me. “How can you be certain?”

  “Because,” I tell him, and I lean into him. “You have nice lips.”

  “Teach me.”

  “What?”

  “You’re my instructor. Teach me how to kiss.”

  “I’m not teaching you how to kiss.”

  “It’s sort of your job.” Jack glances over at me, a twinkle in his eye. “And you owe me a kiss.”

  “Have you ever considered the fact that there’s no follow up because you never call these ladies after you kiss them?”

  Jack frowns, but he doesn’t have a response.

  “Don’t play stupid, Jack. You know as well as I do that if any of these women had caught your attention, you would’ve pursued them. If there haven’t been any second dates, it’s because you didn’t want them.”

  “That’s...” Jack trails off mid-response.

  While he’s thinking, my mind replays something he said that I glossed right. “What do you mean, I owe you a kiss?”

  “New Year’s Eve,” he says. “The first night we tried alcohol.”

  “Yeah, you don’t want that kiss back.”

  Jack smiles. “How about a new one?”

  I shake my head. “No. I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

  “Why not?”

  I puzzle on this as we walk. He grasps my hand in his, and it feels nice enough that I don’t let go. It’s comforting, walking side by side, only the moon and the stars and the lapping waves to hear our conversation. The guise of darkness covers our inhibitions, helped along by the wine, enhanced by the tingle of electricity from Jack’s skin on mine.

  It feels almost romantic. Almost special, almost magical.

  As if this could be real.

  But it’s not, and I remind myself of this as I face Jack with an apologetic smile. “First, a kiss requires an element of surprise. Spontaneity. You know, something to sweep a girl off her feet and—”

  Without warning, Jack drops my heels onto the sand and pulls me into an embrace. One of his arms grasps tight around my back, the other cradling beneath my knees as he sweeps me off my feet and against his chest. “Like this?”

  “Um, yeah, I guess, but Jack!” My voice raises in alarm. “My shoes!”

  “Shoes?” He frowns, as if he’d forgotten all about the heels he’d been holding in his hands. “Oh, shit.”

  I wouldn’t normally care so much about a pair of shoes, but a teacher’s salary means I’m not rolling in dough, and I’d saved for three months to buy these beauties. Which means I’ll do a lot to save them. Including the ditching of another kiss from the illustrious Jack Darcy.

  “Grab them!” I sound like an excitable mouse. “Don’t let the shoes drown!”

  Jack kicks off his own dress shoes and begins to roll up his pants. He tosses his phone and wallet to safety before wading further in. I, too, try to hold up the edges of my dress, but eventually I wade in the ocean up to my waist and I forget all about the dress. I got the dress on sale. I paid full price for the shoes. If I’m saving one, it’s going to be the shoes.

  “I thought Cinderella left her shoes behind,” Jack grumbled, stomping into the water behind me. “She didn’t go back for them.”

  “Yeah, well Cinderella’s shoes appeared magically, and they were supposed to disappear at midnight,” I tell him as I lunge for the first shoe bobbing just beyond my reach. “My shoes aren’t going anywhere, except the bottom of the ocean if you don’t get moving. And I had to eat rice and beans for a month to afford these beauties.”

  “I’ll buy you a new pair of shoes.”

  “That’s not the point!” I lunge again and miss entirely. I splash around futilely in the crashing waves as I face Jack, a sopping mess. “Not to mention, since when do you know anything about fairytales, you romance-noob?”

  “I know Cinder-fucking-ella!” He curses as a wave catches him by surprise and bowls him over. “I hate Cinderella.”

  “Don’t hate on Cinderella,” I manage to gurgle before the wave hits me a second later.

  I’m down for the count then, too. The water swirls over me, all salty and frigid, and it’s in that moment that a spiky object connects head on with my back. Limbs flail, I struggle for the surface and catch a glimpse of Jack’s arms waving a few feet away as he lumbers toward me.

  “My shoe! Get it!” I thumb behind my body as Jack resurfaces, coughing up a lung and a half while he dives for me.

  He misses the shoe and hits me instead. He’s much bigger than I am, even when I’m wearing my beautiful heels, and his force brings me underwater. It’s a full-on football tackle, and I tell him this as I’m lifted to the surface in his arms.

  “I didn’t tackle you,” he says. “And even if I did...” He gives a cheeky little grin, all cute and boyish, and holds up one shoe in his hand. “Success.”

  “What about the other one?”

  He looks annoyed. “The other one?”

  “I can’t walk around on one shoe, Jack. I’d look like an idiot.”

  “I look like an idiot,” he says, glancing down at himself. “I’ll buy you a new pair of shoes.”

  I can’t respond to his comment because I’m too busy properly taking in the view of a sopping wet Jack Darcy. He looks like anything but an idiot. He looks like one of those romance cover models, all sopping wet and brooding. Except instead of brooding, he’s pissed, and he directs his anger toward diving into the water just to my right and disappearing.

  “Jack!” I yell, but he’s already gone. I mutter my own string of curses as I dive in after him, realizing that probably, I could’ve let the shoes drown. Better the shoes drown than my best friend.

  There’s no sign of Jack resurfacing yet, and I’m doggy paddling out past my comfort zone. The night is dark, save for the stars, and there’s not a single person on shore. Probably because it’s close to midnight, and it’s technically illegal to be on this beach.

  Or, probably, because only idiots go swimming in waters dangerous enough to swallow a pair of Louboutin stilettos. And I’m the idiot who chased in after them instead of forgetting the shoes and sinking into Jack’s arms and savoring his sure-to-be-orgasmic kiss.

  “Jack, don’t die, please!” I yell to the white tops of the waves
. “The shoes aren’t worth it.”

  Jack’s head bobs above the surface just as I’m wishing for him to pop up.

  “No shit,” he says.

  Then he’s gone again, and I’m doggy-paddling after him like a lunatic with only the beam of moonlight to lead the way. The water pelts toward me, saltwater burning down my throat as I cough and splutter and generally struggle toward the place where Jack disappeared.

  When he still doesn’t surface after too long, I shout again, waving my arms and legs in hopes I’ll get a touch of him. The night is black, the ocean is blacker, and my worry is growing exponentially by the millisecond.

  “Jack—” My screech is cut off midway as he breaks through the cresting waves so close to me our chests are practically touching. “Jack,” I whisper, my heart thumping against my chest. “I’m sorry. You can let the shoes go.”

  Jack winks. “Or, you could thank me.”

  I gape as he holds up a my soggy, but perfectly intact, other shoe. “Oh, thank you, Jack.”

  I throw my arms around him and, because the water is too deep for me here, I use him for buoy. He’s standing in a way that’s so sturdy it makes me think he can touch the bottom, so I go ahead and wrap my legs around his waist for balance. I let my head fall onto his shoulder as my breaths come in ragged gulps. I hiccup once, and then giggle.

  “I’m so sorry I made you—”

  “Like this?” he asks, ever so softly.

  “Like what—” My question drifts off into the sound of pummeling waves as Jack’s free hand reaches for me.

  He grasps my chin between his thumb and middle finger and tilts it gentle as a breeze until I’m facing him. Our lips hover just millimeters apart, and the closeness between us is so intense I shiver.

  “Are you cold?” His breath whispers across my lips, smelling of fresh gum and a hint of wine. “You’re shivering.”

  “No.”

  “Then you’re shivering because...” Jack eases my shoes into my hands so his are free. He cups me around the waist with both of his hands. “Of this?”

  My dress has wrapped oddly around my waist thanks to the thrashing water, and Jack eases his hands underneath. His thumb brushes across that erogenous zone below my belly button, just above my panties. My eyes close of their own accord, my lips trembling with a low moan. Jack groans, his thumb skimming across the thin strap of my lace underthings until his fingers curl into my bottom and pull me close.